Impulsive
by Asfaloth-Sekhmet
Summary: One shot based off of the quote in Season 5, Episode 22: 'I was just feeling impulsive! I should have just gotten a tiny tattoo on my ankle' Tl;dr, the soon-to-be Pam Halpert gets a tiny tattoo on her ankle instead of joining the Michael Scott Paper Company.


**A/N: Wrote this in a night and felt like I wanted to share! Enjoy.**

Michael is off on another one of his tangents, except this time it actually involves the loss of his job.

The famed boss of Dunder Mifflin Scranton has quit, due to a supervisor he no longer feels comfortable with. In his two weeks notice, Pam has had to deal with interviewees, Michael's amped up distractions (including a totally new company he's invented out of sheer panic at the fact that he has actually quit), and a new boss that frays all of her nerves on the spot.

She thinks that it is likely this won't end well.

By the time Hank and Charles enter Michael's office together with the sheet of Dunder Mifflin paper on it that has had its logo replaced with 'Michael Scott Paper Company' across the top, she knows this definitely won't end well.

Several unbelievable things happen all at once; Michael is escorted from the building without even being able to finish his goodbyes, the office crowds around the window to watch him climb into his car, and about an hour later he is back, army crawling around the office to try and rope the employees of the Scranton branch into quitting with him. He manages to stay moderately stealthy until he tries to drag Phyllis away in her chair, at which point he is caught by none other than Charles himself. A brief verbal altercation follows, and Michael is gone yet again.

Charles, fuming mad, retreats to his office and slams the door shut.

Pam stares at the door, a sudden realization overcoming her. She needs to make a decision; she has the option to be the only person who will follow her true boss out of that door and show devotion to a rightful manager, or she has the option to stay and keep a stable job, health benefits, and the luxury of working so close to her fiance. She briefly weighs the odds, and then remembers the stupidity in even contemplating such a thing before choosing the latter. **  
**  
Before she knows it, she's getting up from her desk and walking to Charles' temporary office in the conference room, hands clenching as she tries not to run after Michael. She wants to help him so very badly - in that pity sort of way because she knows he's self destructing and the least thing she can do is be there for him when everyone else refuses to.

 _But you have other things to think about. Like yourself, for once_. Her brain chides her, drilling it into her heart that Michael has dug this grave for himself yet again.

"Is there something I can help you with?"

"I'm not feeling too well," A lie falls out of her mouth before she can help it, and she hopes that clenching her stomach and making a strange face will aid her case in front of her new boss. "I was just wondering if I could take the afternoon off? I think I'm coming down with the flu, and Kevin's agreed to cover the phones for me."

Charles contemplates this, and probably deduces that the accounting department can go a day without Kevin's assistance before nodding his head curtly. Without another word, Pam has been dismissed for the day, and is already zooming past Jim's desk again to grab her coat. She knows what she's going to do.

"Going somewhere?" Her fiance stops her before she can exit, and she looks up at him with a fleeting grin.

"I'm going to get a tattoo." She keeps her voice down, and nods her head when Jim fixes her with a disbelieving expression.

"A tattoo." Jim confirms, leaning over on her desk as she rapidly packs her purse and fiends a sniffle when she catches Charles on his way to the bathroom. "That's nothing like you."

"I know," Her shoulders slump momentarily, but she doesn't stop packing as she begins to explain her thought process - which feels like it's moving at the speed of light - to her future husband. "But I just keep letting things build up, and build up, and then I do something way too big! I need an outlet, and with today..."

She trails off and Jim thinks for a moment, regarding her carefully. "You were going to go after Michael, weren't you?"

"Sue me!" Pam groans, and closes her purse before quickly darting over to accounting. "Hey Kev - could you cover the phones for today? I'm not feeling too well."

"Got it!" Kevin replies in his hearty baritone, nodding once as Oscar eyes her strangely. She doesn't stop for long enough to listen; right now, she doesn't care less about what 'Mr. Actually' has to say about her fiending illness, especially with his own track record of two hour lunches and long weekends spent with Gill.

Excitedly bounding back to reception, she accepts a kiss on the forehead from Jim who promises her that he will try to keep an eye on Kevin - as well as this strange situation at the office - and they agree on Chinese dinner for the evening. Things are always easy to plan with Jim; it's one of the things she appreciates about their relationship - most things come easy.

"I'd much rather you get a tattoo than lose your job," Jim is honest, letting out another breath of laughter as he obviously still can't believe she is doing this. "Don't get anything too stupid, or we'll have to call off the wedding, Beesly."

"I'll be sure to get your name then." She winks, and after exchanging a last grin with the love of her life she is out the door and on her way to (hopefully) relieving her stress.

There are moments on the twenty minute drive to Madison Tattoo - the closest tattoo parlour she actually knows of as she drives past it multiple times when getting frozen yogurt with Kelly - when she experiences doubt. She thinks of Michael, alone and hopeless, and debates turning around and retrieving his information so that she can find him at his condo complex and bring him back from the weeping and moaning state that he is probably in.

She could go salvage him and help focus him.

She could go make him feel better and help him find another job.

She could let him know that he needs to stop living in a fantasy world and forcefully drag him back to reality - again.

She doesn't. She keeps on driving, holds her head up high and reminds herself that there are bigger problems than Michael Scott in the world. She needs to focus, and find more productive ways of channeling her stress than fixing the issues of a man who refuses to stop self imploding. So she puts the pedal to the metal and completes the rest of the journey to the parlour.

Upon arrival, she is rightfully nervous. She has no idea what she is getting on her body, and she knows that if she doesn't want to feel regret for the rest of her natural born life she is going to have to think of something before she makes a fool of herself.

So Pam parks her car in the compact spot and pulls out her sketchbook. It takes a couple rounds to figure out what she wants, and eventually she figures out something. She knows she wants it to do with Jim, and she wants it to be something she likes, but she can't make it too obnoxious or she knows she will end up hating it. She ends up with cute little yogurt cup that says 'mixed berry' on the front, with purple, red and white tones mixing together.

She thinks Jim would understand, as it is a courtesy to the first words he ever spoke to her, and she loves mixed berry yogurt. She always has.

It's personal, it's cute, and it's very her.

Satisfied, she waltzes into the tattoo parlour and inquires as to walk-in appointments, to which the heavily tattooed man responds that today they have plenty of free space. He books her in, tells her to wait a moment, and before she knows it she is speaking with an artist about her idea and pricing. Everything seems to move too fast; her drawing is taken, scanned, stenciled and given back to her before she is told to lay down and remove her shoes and socks. The shop is almost empty save for a fellow getting his arm finished up, but Pam refuses to be intimidated.

She remembers the annoying impulsivity that she can't get rid of. Remembers the anger she feels towards Michael. Remembers the trouble she always gets into when she tries to help him. She deserves this; deserves something positive coming from a Michael experience where everything usually turns to blended crap.

"First tattoo?" Her artist inquires as he cleans her ankle with some sort of antiseptic and then rubs it with what seems to be vaseline.

She nods, and gulps heavily.

"You'll be just fine - it's just a pinch."

It's more than just a pinch, but she can't blame him for attempting to reassure her.

She squeezes the leather bed and crunches up the paper she is lying on, grinding her teeth to try and get through the pain. The buzz of the tattoo gun hurts her ears almost as much as it hurts her right ankle, but she knows the product will be worth it. What takes about half an hour feels like centuries dragging by as her foot is tortured, the rest of her body's muscles contracting and relaxing as they try to keep up with the level of pain coursing through her.

She hopes it will end soon, and eventually it does. Cool water is washed over the new piece of artwork, much to the surprise and relief of Pam, and she glances down at her ankle to find her design - all hers, and no one else's - stitched into her flesh. It will be there forever, and Pam is okay with that.

Overall, including setup and actual tattooing time, the price isn't that bad. She ends up tipping the artist a bit, and thanking him for her first experience to which he responds that she is welcome anytime. She feels calmer as she exits the shop, as if the pain has assisted her in letting go of the stress. She leaves it wherever it left her, and feels like an anvil sitting on her chest has been lifted.

She doesn't even think of Michael, nor think of what her situation would have been like if she had made a very different decision earlier in the day.

Jim loves it.

He sees it the next morning when she unwraps it to wash it and his first reaction is to unleash an idiotic grin. He can't help it, and Pam grins too. It's a piece of both of them that she can carry around proudly, and that feels right.

On the way to work, amidst more teasing comments about her becoming a full blown ink addict to cope with the stress of their day to day office life, Pam decides that perhaps impulsivity isn't so bad after all.

 **A/N: Hope you liked! Let me know if you did. I've been mulling this idea over in my head for awhile now, and glad I finally got around to writing it.**


End file.
